10-09-2020, 01:03 AM
How 'bout a thread on how all these various mini-crises--including the almost coup in Michigan--destabilize the country to the point of threatening national security?
National security experts describe a distracted and potentially vulnerable country
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/national-security-experts-describe-a-distracted-and-potentially-vulnerable-country/2020/10/04/54f31870-05e2-11eb-a2db-417cddf4816a_story.html
The U.S. president is hospitalized with a virus he refused to treat as a grave threat, in the final weeks of an election whose results he will not pledge to accept, as the nation confronts a struggling economy, an unyielding pandemic and racial unrest.
The combination of these crises has plunged the United States into a vortex of potential vulnerability that national security experts said is probably without precedent.
Consumed by its own difficulties, the country is in a poor position to respond to provocations by adversaries, advance its foreign policy interests with support from allies, or serve as a credible model of functioning democracy, former senior national security officials said.
“I see weakness and division and above all else distractedness,” said Nick Rasmussen, who served as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in the Obama and Trump administrations. “Any problem anywhere else is just a third- or fourth-order problem right now because we are so self-absorbed, inward looking and consumed with our own toxicity. And when you’re distracted, you make mistakes.”
The fallout spread swiftly over the weekend, radiating outward from the president. More than a half-dozen White House aides, Republican lawmakers and senior operatives have also tested positive for the novel coronavirus after flouting health protocols at public events, triggering panic in quarters of the West Wing and forcing the Senate to shut its doors to prevent further spread.
National security experts describe a distracted and potentially vulnerable country
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/national-security-experts-describe-a-distracted-and-potentially-vulnerable-country/2020/10/04/54f31870-05e2-11eb-a2db-417cddf4816a_story.html
The U.S. president is hospitalized with a virus he refused to treat as a grave threat, in the final weeks of an election whose results he will not pledge to accept, as the nation confronts a struggling economy, an unyielding pandemic and racial unrest.
The combination of these crises has plunged the United States into a vortex of potential vulnerability that national security experts said is probably without precedent.
Consumed by its own difficulties, the country is in a poor position to respond to provocations by adversaries, advance its foreign policy interests with support from allies, or serve as a credible model of functioning democracy, former senior national security officials said.
“I see weakness and division and above all else distractedness,” said Nick Rasmussen, who served as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in the Obama and Trump administrations. “Any problem anywhere else is just a third- or fourth-order problem right now because we are so self-absorbed, inward looking and consumed with our own toxicity. And when you’re distracted, you make mistakes.”
The fallout spread swiftly over the weekend, radiating outward from the president. More than a half-dozen White House aides, Republican lawmakers and senior operatives have also tested positive for the novel coronavirus after flouting health protocols at public events, triggering panic in quarters of the West Wing and forcing the Senate to shut its doors to prevent further spread.
![[Image: 4CV0TeR.png]](https://i.imgur.com/4CV0TeR.png)
